Homeschooling is not for everyone. It’s not even for most. It takes diligence, creativity, a willingness to learn (all the time), and a passion for seeing your children grow in wisdom and intelligence, two things that are not always the same. If you have all of these things and are considering homeschooling, there is something else you should consider before you begin.

To illustrate this “something more” that you will need, I’d like to quote a line from the movie Selena. In the movie, the father is describing the difficulty in taking his Mexican-American family into Mexico to do a concert. He feels his family may not be prepared for the double-standard that they will face as Americans, whose first language is English, when they travel to sing songs in Spanish to a Mexican national audience. He says, “We have to be more Mexican than the Mexicans, and more American than the Americans, both at the same time. It’s exhausting!”

Homeschooling has this double standard in some ways. As a homeschooler, you will be expected to be more educated and intelligent in order to prove the validity of homeschooling to those who doubt you, but you will also be expected to be “different” in ways that let others rationalize your decision to homeschool. To get into college, you may be expected to show more scholastic evidence, have higher scores, and submit to additional testing in many cases, but you will also be shown as proof of their diversity when colleges accept you. There is a double standard for homeschoolers and being aware of it is important.

If you are already homeschooling, then you know all about this. If you are just beginning to consider homeschooling, then keep this in mind. Either way, it is important that you follow a practice of documenting your work, keeping good records, preparing for tests diligently, including standardized tests such as SAT and ACT tests, and maintaining an identity that is consistent with who you are and what your core values are. Ultimately, that is the only way that you will be able to effectively homeschool.

As Selena and her family realized, they had to be true to themselves but mindful of the context in which they sang. For homeschoolers, this is true as well. There are regulations and standards to follow. If you are unfamiliar with the state codes in your area, visit the Homeschool Legal Defense Association’s website and get help. Know them well so that you can know the context in which you are educating your children. But, you will also need to know what your goals and purposes are for homeschooling. This will allow you to homeschool for your reasons, not someone else’s. Be true to yourself as a homeschooler, and your children will have the integrity and educational background to handle the double standard.